Rumor: DirecTV considering buying Tivo

[Thomas22]

If Directv did by Tivo, I wonder if, as a condition of the sale, that they would be required to license the DVR technology to Dish for a minor fee. If the the Tivo sale could result in hurting 14 million Dish customers (by losing their DVR), sure that would be addressed before the sale was approved.

Didn't News Corp. have to agree to certain conditions with regard to the Fox channels before they could buy Directv a few years back?

TiVo is not a broadcast company. The FCC has nothing to say about a purchase of TiVo by anyone. This is still a free country in some instances.

 

[Araxen]

I'm surprised this rumor hasn't popped up more frequently. It would be a smart move for Directv to buy up Tivo. Now only if they'll release DVR boxes with enough processing power. The HR24 is a step in the right direction but they need to take it farther.

 

[stonecold]

I'm surprised this rumor hasn't popped up more frequently. It would be a smart move for Directv to buy up Tivo. Now only if they'll release DVR boxes with enough processing power. The HR24 is a step in the right direction but they need to take it farther.

Yet another reason for them to buy tivo considering that tivos are always woefully underpowered.

 

[cfb]

My old series 1 tivo is way faster than my HR20. My dads tivo HD is also much faster than the HR20. Pretty interesting considering the tivo HD has nearly the same hardware and the tivo s/w does pretty much everything the directv box does, only it actually responds to the remote control when you press a button.

I think if I were going to pick any one thing that directv has over tivo, speed of the UI wouldnt make the top ten list.

Maybe the HR24 is a lot better, but I cant see spending $400 and entering another 2 year contract just to get a box that can actually run the software properly.

 

[stonecold]

My old series 1 tivo is way faster than my HR20. My dads tivo HD is also much faster than the HR20. Pretty interesting considering the tivo HD has nearly the same hardware and the tivo s/w does pretty much everything the directv box does, only it actually responds to the remote control when you press a button.

I think if I were going to pick any one thing that directv has over tivo, speed of the UI wouldnt make the top ten list.

Maybe the HR24 is a lot better, but I cant see spending $400 and entering another 2 year contract just to get a box that can actually run the software properly.

What Tivo has over DTV is that while the boxes them selves are underpower they always have been tivo been great at putting the are loads on everything but the cpu. leveraging heavly optimized code the the mpeg2 encoders it had on board leaving tivo with a decent speed ui as the cpu had nothing to due but handle scheduling and UI. There is a great article I read on Series 1 and I cant find it any more it really dives into the inner workings of the modified linux they use.

 

[cfb]

I'm pretty familiar with the inner workings of tivo; I've been hacking them since they came out.

What they do thats primarily different from the directv box is that the directv box tries to do an awful lot of things in real time like guide data processing, record/stop record decisions, etc. All too often they end up with too much to do and the user hits a remote control button and nothing happens for 3-5 seconds.

Tivo processes its guide data all at once, often in the middle of the night, and makes its to-do list periodically rather than in real time. While that sometimes leads to things like the much maligned "please wait..." when changing the order of the season pass list, it doesnt make the box have to do heavy duty work while you're just recording and watching shows.

So two different approaches: one built an architecture that doesnt overburden the box, the other just kept throwing wood on the fire until they needed a new box to handle the load.

But directv wants to showcase a lot of their programming and offer a lot of real time stuff to their customers and the standalone tivo really doesnt bother with any of that. Frankly I never use most of the goofy bells and whistles. I just want it to reliably record shows, play them back, and respond to the remote when I press a button.

My five year old cracks me up. He'll press a button on the directv remote and nothing will happen for a few seconds and he'll yell "HEY! HELLO?!? I'm pushing a button over here!".

 

[Brewer4]

The HR24 is really a game changer. The response with all that real time stuff is instantaneous. Well worth the $160-$200 price tag. Whether its better or not from a user preference stand point, for me its like Windows PC that I am accustomed to how it functions and speeding it up 10 fold. Sure the Mac may be a better interface but its on slower hardware and I am not used to it. It takes what I already know and makes it go the speed I would want it to.

I havent converted my season passes yet so cant comment on the recording but individual records all worked fine. My primary recordings are still on the HR20 but even playing the HR20 recorded programs on the HR24 is amazing. Unless Tivo matches that speed in the next version and integrates with the MRV setup, it would be a no go for me.

 

[navychop]

Doesn't the poison pill kick in only during a hostile takeover, or is it for any takeover?

Yes, hostile, as I understand it. That's why I made the comment about getting the board to rescind it $omehow.

 

[Jimbo]

I'm pretty familiar with the inner workings of tivo; I've been hacking them since they came out.

What they do thats primarily different from the directv box is that the directv box tries to do an awful lot of things in real time like guide data processing, record/stop record decisions, etc. All too often they end up with too much to do and the user hits a remote control button and nothing happens for 3-5 seconds.

Tivo processes its guide data all at once, often in the middle of the night, and makes its to-do list periodically rather than in real time. While that sometimes leads to things like the much maligned "please wait..." when changing the order of the season pass list, it doesnt make the box have to do heavy duty work while you're just recording and watching shows.

So two different approaches: one built an architecture that doesnt overburden the box, the other just kept throwing wood on the fire until they needed a new box to handle the load.

But directv wants to showcase a lot of their programming and offer a lot of real time stuff to their customers and the standalone tivo really doesnt bother with any of that. Frankly I never use most of the goofy bells and whistles. I just want it to reliably record shows, play them back, and respond to the remote when I press a button.

My five year old cracks me up. He'll press a button on the directv remote and nothing will happen for a few seconds and he'll yell "HEY! HELLO?!? I'm pushing a button over here!".

You Still haven't upgraded yet ?

 

[cfb]

You Still haven't upgraded yet ?

From what to what?

 

[stonecold]

Hell Jimbo I cant even get them to give me hr24s....

Mainly as they want a good reason they should swap ot my hr22s and apparently because I say so is not justifiable.

 

[Jimbo]

From what to what?

From whatever your son is having a hard time with to a HR24 ....

 

[Jimbo]

Hell Jimbo I cant even get them to give me hr24s....

Mainly as they want a good reason they should swap ot my hr22s and apparently because I say so is not justifiable.

That made me think .....

IF I WANT a particular recvr (HR24) and the recvr I'm wanting to replace is actually OK, I can go out and BUY (lease) it on my own, but when I set it up and activate it, will they question the unit I'm replacing seeing it is still working ?

I guess my point is, are you stuck with what you have if you don't like it regardless ?

 

[Jimbo]

Hell Jimbo I cant even get them to give me hr24s....

Mainly as they want a good reason they should swap ot my hr22s and apparently because I say so is not justifiable.

Tell them the unit's not working .....

 

[joed32]

I'm pretty sure that it doesn't matter, you can deactivate a receiver any time you want to as long as you return it. Just as you can activate a new one anytime you want.

 

[Jimbo]

I'm pretty sure that it doesn't matter, you can deactivate a receiver any time you want to as long as you return it. Just as you can activate a new one anytime you want.

Thats what I was hoping ....

 

[Jimbo]

Hell Jimbo I cant even get them to give me hr24s....

Mainly as they want a good reason they should swap ot my hr22s and apparently because I say so is not justifiable.

Tell them your gonna BUY a HR24 and return the HR22 because you don't like how slow the HR22 is.

Ask for as many discounts as you qualify for !!!!!

Tell them not to make stuff up because you KNOW whats available.

 

[stonecold]

There is alot of factors envovled I just dont want to have to pay for the equipment and there not going to swap it out but again there no real reason for me to get hr24s I am happy with the hr22s .

Employee accounts are more hassle then there worth some times.

 

[cfb]

From whatever your son is having a hard time with to a HR24 ....

I'm absolutely not interested in paying another $400 to directv and getting another 2 year contract just so I can have a box that actually works well with the software they developed.

Its as though microsoft not only made windows, they made all the computers it runs on. They then stick vista on your computer whether you wanted it or not and it runs like a dog. Oh and when they did that, they also killed the computer for half a day and had you unplugging it and resetting it all morning before it'd work again. But for only $400 you can get a new computer that it'll actually work on. But if you then want to quit using it or get something else within the next 2 years it'll cost you $500.

I cant see that too many people would go for this.

I've established before that people with different usage loads get different experiences with the HR's. We have 40-50 series links on both of ours, hundreds of hours of recordings, and larger hard drives than stock, plus our units are almost always recording on both tuners at the same time and we use MRV heavily.

Except for the MRV usage, all this stuff was standard feature material 3+ years ago in the HR's and they were pretty slow then too. So I dont think I'm asking much when I say that it would be nice if directvs programmers wrote code that would do the basics without lousy remote control and UI response times.

Look at it from the perspective of other options available. I could replace my old series 1 tivo's I have sitting in the closet upstairs with a pair of refurbished tivo HD's for $99 each, total $200. I could get digital cable with a comparable channel lineup for about $50, since I already have multiple services with comcast and could get a triple play deal.

I could have a 1tb drive on the tivo, have 100-200 season passes on each one of them, put 300 shows on them, and have good UI response. Save $200 on the boxes. No contract. And save about $50 a month on my bill.

I'm looking for the 'win' in going the directv upgrade route to solve the slow performance issues, and I'm not having much luck finding it.

 

[Jimbo]

I'm absolutely not interested in paying another $400 to directv and getting another 2 year contract just so I can have a box that actually works well with the software they developed.

Its as though microsoft not only made windows, they made all the computers it runs on. They then stick vista on your computer whether you wanted it or not and it runs like a dog. Oh and when they did that, they also killed the computer for half a day and had you unplugging it and resetting it all morning before it'd work again. But for only $400 you can get a new computer that it'll actually work on. But if you then want to quit using it or get something else within the next 2 years it'll cost you $500.

I cant see that too many people would go for this.

I've established before that people with different usage loads get different experiences with the HR's. We have 40-50 series links on both of ours, hundreds of hours of recordings, and larger hard drives than stock, plus our units are almost always recording on both tuners at the same time and we use MRV heavily.

Except for the MRV usage, all this stuff was standard feature material 3+ years ago in the HR's and they were pretty slow then too. So I dont think I'm asking much when I say that it would be nice if directvs programmers wrote code that would do the basics without lousy remote control and UI response times.

Look at it from the perspective of other options available. I could replace my old series 1 tivo's I have sitting in the closet upstairs with a pair of refurbished tivo HD's for $99 each, total $200. I could get digital cable with a comparable channel lineup for about $50, since I already have multiple services with comcast and could get a triple play deal.

I could have a 1tb drive on the tivo, have 100-200 season passes on each one of them, put 300 shows on them, and have good UI response. Save $200 on the boxes. No contract. And save about $50 a month on my bill.

I'm looking for the 'win' in going the directv upgrade route to solve the slow performance issues, and I'm not having much luck finding it.

In your case I would pass.